Water pollution
Research Topic
Language: English
This is a research topic created to provide authors with a place to attach new problem publications.
Research problems linked to this topic
- How can we optimise the food system to support future food production and consumption sustainably whilst reducing environmental impacts?
- How can innovation in chemical production, use, and disposal across the supply chain minimise chemical-related risks, benefiting the circular economy and reducing pollution?
- What are the actions that will have the biggest impact on restoring freshwater habitats as far as possible to more naturally functioning ecosystems?
- What is the status of our natural environment, is it being effectively monitored to note change in the UK and globally? We require robust, reliable data and information that can be used to assess status and trends in the natural environment (genetic and species diversity and trends, invasive species, habitats extent, condition and character, as well as soils and ecosystem services and functions)
- How can we effectively use nature on our land to help provide the services we need (carbon uptake, flood defence, resilience through biodiversity, clean air and water, recreation for public health and so on) and balance the provision of these services?
- How can we assess and mitigate systemic risks involving environmental factors? What are the best approaches for monitoring that tracks system dynamics based on key ‘watchpoints’ to trigger mitigation actions?
- How do we effectively monitor and assess the impact of emerging threats on water quality and ecology (for example plastics, antimicrobial resistance, neonicotinoid pesticides, nanoparticles, pharmaceuticals, invasive species, and chemicals) to inform risk-based decision making?
- How should policies be designed and schemes implemented to help the food and farming sector preserve and enhance the natural environment, while meeting other priorities such as the commitment to net zero emissions of greenhouse gases?
- How will agriculture affect the resilience to climate change of surrounding habitats and communities- for example water availability, flooding, land use change, chemical harm on ecosystem functions related to climate resilience?
- How can we most effectively implement nature-based solutions, such as tree planting and peatland restoration, to address climate change, support progress to net zero carbon emission, reduce biodiversity loss and prevent poverty?
- How do we respond effectively to challenges including a rapidly growing population, changing consumption trends, finite land use, resource constraints, changing climate, globalised markets, and black swan events such as COVID-19 all of which impact on food and farming system security and supply chain resilience?
- Further our understanding of how climate change is affecting the health of the ocean as a result of acidification and warming seas
- How do we better understand the impact of the past, the pressures on the present, and the changes of the future when understanding water and the environment?
- How can we balance different interests at local and national levels, to provide the resources we need, reduce degradation of natural capital and improve the state of the environment?
- What are the trade-offs between primary resource extraction versus reclamation of resources from waste streams in the context of resource security? How circular can the UK economy become?
- Determine the socio-economic costs of plastic litter on marine wildlife, ecosystems, and maritime industries. The costs incurred from changing to other materials, including the potential benefits to be made from new industries including small medium-size enterprise.
- Which interventions can be used to incentivise improvements in water quality in the environment?
- How effective are marine protected areas and how can we monitor and evaluate the ecological, social, economic, and cultural costs and benefits of these areas?
- What actions would most effectively and efficiently improve the status of the natural environment and secure economic, social, and health benefits domestically and globally?
- How do we reduce the impacts of production on the environment through more sustainable food production, processing, and manufacture? And how do we influence consumer choice towards healthy and sustainable dietary choices?
- How will the changing climate affect the persistence and movement of chemical contaminants in the environment?
- How to measure ecological connectivity and design coherent ecological networks through nature restoration?
- How can we promote efficiency and investment in the water sector and incentivise environmentally responsible behaviour from all branches of society?
- What are the population-level impacts of sublethal pesticide and other chemical exposure in the environment?
- Understand the risks from contaminants of emerging concern, micro and macro marine plastic litter, emergencies (for example oil spills), and man-made underwater noise
- How can we manage the land to provide benefits to society and minimise harm to the aquatic ecosystem?
- Using climate-smart management, how do we best protect marine biodiversity that might change as a result of climate change?
- Develop innovative and improved abatement technologies for air pollutant emissions and noise generation across all sectors and sources
- How can the UK optimise sustainable growth of biomass for use in power generation (bioenergy) and, with appropriate storage, for removal of atmospheric CO2? How can the negative environmental consequences from biomass production and use (on soil quality, water quality, air quality, and biodiversity) be minimised? What’s the full life cycle analysis for different feedstock? What’s the scalability of different feedstocks within sustainable limits?
- How can we improve the management of our ecosystems, including biodiversity loss, chemical pollution, environmental degradation, and the introduction of alien species, to reduce the risk of infectious zoonotic, animal, and plant diseases?
- What are the biggest chemical, pesticide, and hazardous waste-related risks to the environment and human health, both in the UK and globally? What are the costs of inaction? How are these risks most effectively monitored and managed, and what is the role of government?
- How will changing freshwater budgets impact river flow, water availability, the risk of flooding, and natural systems?
- How can we monitor prevalence of COVID-19 and similar viruses through our water systems to act as an early warning system and inform public health decisions?